


Itching on a Photograph

by involuntaryorange



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: A Little Bit Funny, Bittersweet, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, Photographs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 10:40:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13293093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/involuntaryorange/pseuds/involuntaryorange
Summary: Arthur discovers an old photo album while helping Dom sort through files in his basement.





	Itching on a Photograph

**Author's Note:**

> For the Twelvetide Drabbles challenge, prompt "Remember who you really are." It seemed like a good opportunity to finish up this ficlet that I started at least a year ago!

“I know it’s around here somewhere,” Dom says. He has a streak of dust on his cheek and there’s a cobweb in his hair. “Can you look in that box over there? The one that says ‘old documents’?”

“You couldn’t have put more descriptive labels on these things?” Arthur asks, flipping open his knife to cut through the package’s tape.

“When we moved here, Mal was eight months pregnant. We didn’t exactly have a lot of time and energy to pack properly.”

Arthur sighs and mutters an apology, though it’s somewhat weakened by a vigorous sneeze. “Jesus, we should have worn dust masks.” He rifles through a stack of manila envelopes containing medical records, but pauses when he reaches a small photo album. “‘Berlin 1995’? What’s this?”

“Oh, that must be photos from when Mal and I were traveling,” Dom says, looking up from a large storage tub full of what appears to be Christmas ornaments. “We spent six months doing research at the Bauhaus archives.”

“You never told me about that,” Arthur says.

Dom shrugs. “It was a long time ago. We weren’t even married yet. It was a great trip; Berlin’s a beautiful city. That’s where we met Eames, actually.”

“At the Bauhaus archives?”

“Not exactly,” Dom says with a smirk. After it becomes clear that Dom isn’t going to elaborate, Arthur takes a deep breath — but not too deep, on account of the dust — and cracks the album open.

It’s still a punch to the gut, seeing her. Page after page of Dom and Mal, looking young and happy: kissing in front of Brandenburg Gate, picnicking in the park, standing next to the Berlin Wall, admiring various buildings of architectural merit. Arthur laughs through the tears in his eyes — it’s dusty, all right? — at a picture of Mal posing suggestively with a sausage. It’s next to a photo of Dom giving his best “serious professional” look, sitting on a park bench in a tweed blazer with elbow patches.

And then…

“What the _fuck_?”

Eames, looking painfully young — he couldn’t have been more than 18 — wearing hotpants and eyeliner and nothing else. He was slim, not yet fully grown into his limbs, and his skin was pale and unmarked, his hair longer, hanging over his forehead. He had an arm thrown around Mal and a carefree grin on his face, crooked teeth on display.

Dom leans over Arthur’s shoulder to look at the photo, his lips twisted into a bittersweet smile.

“He was working at a gay nightclub. You know Mal always loved taking in strays.”

“Working as…”

“A cage dancer.”

Arthur composes and dismisses several dozen replies before settling on an incredulous “ _What_?”

“Mal never mentioned that?”

“Uh, no.”

“Huh,” Dom remarks, unhelpfully.

“I always assumed you met him in dreamshare.”

“Nah, we brought him into the business after he got into some legal trouble.”

“Legal trouble?”

“Fraud, counterfeiting.” Dom suddenly looks guilty. “I probably shouldn’t be telling you this.”

“Probably not,” Arthur says. He knows Dom means it’s a violation of Eames’s trust, but Arthur’s more concerned with the way his own image of Eames is shifting, rearranging itself like paradoxical architecture. He’d always just kind of assumed that Eames emerged from the womb a fully-formed, gabardine-clad adult, ready to unleash a torrent of sarcasm upon the world. He can’t square that assumption away with this new vision of Eames, young and beautiful, smiling and practically naked and making some truly terrible life decisions.

When Dom goes back to rummaging through boxes, Arthur slips his phone out of his pocket and takes a picture of the photo. He’s not sure what he’s going to do with it, if anything, but he feels compelled to have it. He’s never been able to resist a good puzzle, and for the first time he realizes that Eames might be a _really_ good puzzle.


End file.
